Going to TMC CDL training

Ya, for whatever reason...I've found that nobody knows for sure and the only way you or I will find out exactly what the weight is, is the day we arrive to orientation and lift it ourselves.

That day for me is tomorrow, so if I get time tomorrow night to post my experience (short of them telling me/us that we can't discuss orientation day, etc), I will.

 

a funny story.....my room mate I was assigned had a sleeping order and snored very loud all night long all week long. I am a very light sleeper so I was not getting very good sleep and then being out their in a different time zone didn't help. I felt I needed to start stressing my body to allow me to sleep better so I took advantage of the gym area . I would be the only one in there. Look around you will see a lot of cameras. One day prior to the tarp lift George made a comment about working out in the class room. I just smiled at him....If he only knew the real reason. The day we took the test I did everything I was told . After getting off the trailer I slid the lumber tarp on my shoulder and walked to where they wanted it for the next guy. I leaned forward and let that tarp fly about 4' to the ground like a sack of concrete. George just looked at me and I thought I just failed. Guess he didn't know I was in heavy highway construction for 30 years. Oh well passed and moved on down the road.

 

Will do and thanks for the reassurance!

 

Welp, I passed the physical, but that ##### was heavy and not easy to throw onto the shoulder of my 160lb frame.

But I did it.

We lost 1/2 the class to DOT physical issues and may have been 1 to the physical test.

We started with 15.

 

Wow well I am glad to hear that you passed but now im just a more nervous.

Is there any specific reason why people are failing the physical? Are they just simply out of shape or just too small to be performing the intense labor that comes with flatbed?

 

I should have chosen my words a bit better.

We lost 1/3-to-1/2 of the class at the DOT physical portion for reasons I'm not sure of. Were there a ton of guys out of shape? Absofrigginlutely...some young and some old and equally out of shape and some smokers...so just seemed like a bad recipe for them.

We lost 1 guy that didn't even bring his drivers license with him...but something doesn't add up with him, because he left his state knowing he didn't have it and didn't think that TMC would require it, despite it being the #1 thing they tell you 100x to make sure you bring.

We may have lost 1 guy on the tarp test, but I'm not 100%. They moved our ladder from the inside of the building to the outside due to weather being nice, so we had to scale this 30' ladder to the top of a container atop a trailer.

Apparently, a guy (via another thread around here) showed up and didn't know TMC wouldn't allow dreads, etc. I guess he left too because I didn't see anyone left in our now small class with long hair.

Bring your DL, Cut your hair, Be able to sling 120lb tarp twice, and climb a ladder day one, and you should be WAY ahead of most.

 

So, what happened to the OP here?
It’s been nearly a year since his last post; did he even make it through training? Seems that every new driver posting on his experiences on these forums vanishes just as quickly as he appeared.
What is going on with this company?

All you potentially new guys reading on these forums are hopefully getting the message in regards to all the large trucking companies; there is a reason why nearly 98% of all new drivers don’t last a year, if even that.
Hint: it’s not because drivers simply “can’t hack it”.

The real reason is very simple; low pay for long hours and bad conditions, as in $500.00-$750.00 per week for up to 100 hours per week of work while living 24 hours a day inside a small box with infrequent bathing and low quality, way overpriced ‘food’ from truck stops.

Perhaps the only entertainment available will be the guy parked next to you taking a dump next to your right front fender at 7 in the morning. Always a pleasure to see.

 

What did it cost you to break your contract early?